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NYCEDC And ESD Announce Bowne & Co. To Move To Lower Manhattan

March 01, 2005

Economic Development Corporation (EDC) President Andrew M. Alper and Empire State Development (ESD) Chairman Charles A. Gargano today announced that Bowne & Co. has made a major commitment to Lower Manhattan by agreeing to move 424 employees to 55 Water Street. Founded in Lower Manhattan in 1775, Bowne is returning downtown with the assistance of a grant through the Job Creation and Retention Program (JCRP) for relocating in Lower Manhattan and committing to retain employees in New York City.

“Bowne’s commitment to Lower Manhattan provides a major boost to the local economy, with the addition of more than 400 jobs to the area,” said EDC President Alper. “It also represents the latest in a series of relocations to Lower Manhattan by companies from a wide array of industries. I am pleased we could facilitate Bowne’s return Downtown through the JCRP Program and help strengthen and diversify Lower Manhattan’s economy.”

Bowne, the oldest listed company on the New York Stock Exchange, will move 424 employees from its location at 345 Hudson Street. The company plans to retain 560 jobs in total in New York City, including 120 at its location on West 31st Street and 16 employees currently at 2 Rector Street.

“Working in partnership with the City, we continue to attract and retain vital businesses in Lower Manhattan,” ESC Chairman Gargano said. “Together we have used our resources to help create and retain nearly 74,000 jobs downtown. Our rebuilding and economic recovery efforts for Lower Manhattan have been unprecedented, and I congratulate Bowne & Co. on its decision to return Downtown.”

As the world’s largest financial printer, Bowne offers an array of transactional and compliance-related services to create, manage, translate and distribute documents. Bowne Enterprise Solutions, a business unit of Bowne, offers digital printing and electronic delivery of personalized communications. Through Bowne Global Solutions, the company provides a broad range of localization services, which help companies adapt communications developed in one country to meet the social, cultural and business requirements for successful distribution in another. Bowne’s Litigation Solutions provides a comprehensive suite of support services for law firms and law departments, including off-site imaging and coding, electronic data discovery processing, and complete database support.

Philip E. Kucera, Bowne’s Chief Executive Officer, said, “We're happy to take this opportunity to contribute to the revitalization of Lower Manhattan, the financial capital of the world. For nearly 230 years, we have served the financial and professional services industries with great integrity and pride. By returning Downtown, we are going back to our roots and will be closer to many of our clients. And we’re pleased to say that even those clients not located downtown will find us more accessible than ever before. We are delighted to be able to help the downtown area, while also providing our clients with a state-of-the-art facility.”

Bowne will receive about $1.6 million in JCRP funds. Since September 11th, 2001, EDC and ESD have approved about $286 million in JCRP grants to 74 companies to assist in the economic recovery of Lower Manhattan. The Program has helped retain and create more than 81,000 jobs in New York City. Of this total, 67,000 jobs have been retained and 5,900 jobs will be created in Lower Manhattan. In addition, nearly 9,000 New York City jobs will be retained outside Lower Manhattan.

JCRP – jointly administered by EDC and ESD – is designed to stabilize the job base in Lower Manhattan, restore the vibrancy of the downtown community, encourage the creation of new jobs, attract new businesses and diversify the downtown economy. The program targets large companies because they account for more than half of all the private sector jobs in Lower Manhattan, which in turn support thousands of smaller-sized businesses.

The grant terms of JCRP are discretionary but require the commitment of the companies to a minimum seven-year stay in Lower Manhattan. The grant determination is based on criteria such as proximity to the World Trade Center site, economic and fiscal impact, early commitment, number of jobs retained, number of jobs created, and risk of relocation.

While Lower Manhattan remains the financial services capital of the world, companies from non-traditional industries such as the health care, media, telecommunications, legal and now publishing industries are locating or making long-term commitments downtown. Together with the other World Trade Center grant programs, JCRP has proven a powerful tool in securing companies from a range of sectors. Examples include the Health Insurance Plan of Greater New York (HIP), which recently opened new corporate headquarters at 55 Water Street, Media Planning Group, a strategic communications company that signed a lease at 195 Broadway, and the law firm Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, which signed a 450,000-square-foot lease at the World Financial Center late last year.

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